


Imperfection

by afteriwake



Series: Sherlolly Spring Fling - April/May 2017 [17]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: All Hands on Deck, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Be Careful What You Wish For, Body Horror, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Heartbreak, Inspired by Music, Jealous molly, MInor Sherlock Holmes/Janine, Molly Disappears, Moral Lessons, No One Recognizes Molly, Not What I Wanted At All, POV Molly Hooper, Past Molly Hooper/Tom - Freeform, Poor Molly, Post-Episode: s03e02 The Sign of Three, Scotland Yard, Self Confidence Issues, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Sherlock Holmes Has a Heart, Sherlock Holmes Loves Molly Hooper, Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper Kissing, Wishes, Wishes Reversed, Worst nightmare, all is well, sherlock is heartbroken
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-26
Updated: 2017-05-05
Packaged: 2018-09-20 01:22:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9469202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: All Molly wants is a few things in life: her confidence back, the man she wanted all along, and happiness. When she decides to take her chance and it all goes horribly wrong and a man says he can make her dreams come true, she decides to accept his help for the chance at having it all. But she learns the hard way to be careful what you wish for...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chitarra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chitarra/gifts).



> So this fic is actually two separate fics requested by **Chitarra** inspired by songs that were combined into one fic. The first two chapters are inspired by "[Never Surrender](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2I8XVGagROg)" by Skillet, and the rest of the story is inspired by "[Imperfection](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpKz8JK5Pwo)," also by Skillet. It's set after "The Sign of Three" but before "His Last Vow."

  
_Do you know what it's like when_   
_You're not who you wanna be?_   
_Do you know what it's like to_   
_Be your own worst enemy_   
_Who sees the things in me I can't hide?_   
_Do you know what it's like_   
_To wanna surrender?_   


So much had happened lately, so much had...changed. She had started to wonder if maybe, just maybe, she meant something a little more to Sherlock. After the fall, after everything, she had _seemed_ to be more important. They were friends in a way they hadn’t been before. He trusted her, used her home as a bolt hole, told her things she probably shouldn’t know, let her keep his secrets.

And she...well, she trusted him. Maybe that was foolish of her, she knew. She had trusted him with the thoughts and feelings she’d had about her relationship with Tom, when all her friends and her family had been convinced that he was “just perfect,” that perhaps he wasn’t. He’d asked her if she _really_ wanted to know, and when she said yes, he had his brother come round with photographs and detailed surveillance. He’d known Tom was scum, but he was holding his tongue at first because she was happy. She didn’t know whether to be angry or happy, and in the end, she decided to be relieved that he had told her, eventually, but worried he could have kept it from her indefinitely. Though, to be quite honest, she was fairly sure she and Tom never would have gotten to marriage stage. One or the other Holmes brother would have ensured that much. Whether she found out the truth why would have been a different matter.

The fact he hadn’t wanted to hurt her had given her hope. Maybe he cared in a...more than friendly way. Maybe? If he didn’t, of course, then she was just deluding herself, and she was quite good at that. She’d been good at that for years, of course. Deluded herself about Sherlock, of course, but Jim too...no, Moriarty, must call him by his true name...and now Tom too. Oh, she did know how to pick them, really. But she couldn’t be all that bad at judging men, could she? After all, there was something different about Sherlock. Sociopath though he might be, he had a bit of a heart on him. He’d shown it, not just to her but to others. She’d seen it. It couldn’t all be an act.

Could it?

She had thought, once and for all, maybe she should buck up the courage and make a move. Be the bold girl and ask him for coffee and not let him brush her off with “black, two sugars” again. Let him know she wanted a coffee _date_. With _him_. Involving them going to a shop together and sitting down and chatting in public and all of that. And if it led t something else, then great! Wonderful! She’d love that, she’d love that so much.

And if it didn’t, then she’d finally have her answer and she could let go of her infatuation with William Sherlock Scott Holmes and move on, focus on maybe picking a different sort of man. Not a sociopath, not a psychopath, and not scum. There had to be a decent man in the world left _somewhere_ , she was sure of it. Her mum had found one again. John was decent and Mary had snatched him right up. Even Greg had a steady date these days. There had to be somebody for her if Sherlock wasn’t it.

She remembered the comments he had made about her over the years. She was glad she had chosen her outfit with care today; the shirt she wore was a little more figure-hugging than usual, her cardigan a little more form-fitting. She had a figure, she just rarely showed it off. Clothes were a form of armor, she supposed, and had been for some time. Even when she was with Tom, she felt the need to protect herself from the world. She had felt the need to keep herself safe and had hoped he would love her even when she was a bit frumpy.

Apparently, he hadn’t. No, not when he could have--

Not what she needed to dwell on now.

She unbuttoned an extra button at the top, just to be a little daring. She wasn’t set to do work for a bit, so it was all right if she let her hair down. It was a bit crimped from the hair tie, so in the end, she coiled it into a knot at the base of her neck. Still up, though not as little girly as a ponytail, and still lovely. She hoped. She applied a little lipstick as well, just a smidge darker than her usual shade, enough to make her lips really pop, and then blotted it on a bit of tissue because no, no, it was too dark. She looked like a whore on the high street. What was she _thinking_?

The shirt was buttoned up, the lipstick was wiped off completely, but the hair stayed knotted at the neck because admittedly, that looked pretty. Oh, why couldn’t she see herself as pretty anymore? Once upon a time, she’d thought she looked lovely. Sometimes even desirable. She’d seen the look on Greg’s face at the Christmas party all that time ago when she walked in in the black dress. She heard some of the whistles on the street when she’d gone out with her mates to go dance or get a drink. When did the confidence go away?

Oh yes. When she was passed over for Miss Perfect. How could she forget?

She’d worked hard to build her confidence from being the timid mouse in the morgue that had started at Barts, the one who had watched Sherlock in fascination and been turned into a gofer for coffee. For Christ’s sake, she’d dated the most dangerous criminal in all of London! And broken up with him! She should feel like a bloody goddess among women!

And yet here she was, in her office, fretting over unbuttoned buttons and a darker shade of lipstick. All because her heart had been broken in the cruelest of ways. It’s one thing to be told someone doesn’t love you anymore; it’s another to be told someone chose someone else who’s a better model. And then to be told it’s all _your_ fault, because you have another man in your heart? She had been over Sherlock, she had. She had moved on and they had been _just_ friends.

But it had stung nonetheless.

She supposed that, perhaps, asking Sherlock to coffee was partly a slap in Tom’s face. But try as she might, she couldn’t stomp on all her feelings for Sherlock, even if these days he came by less, was a little more distant. Maybe this was her attempt to see if she was going to be able to keep him, or if she would lose him, too.

She hoped she didn’t lose him.

She wasn’t sure she could bear it.


	2. Chapter 2

_Tears falling down again_   
_Tears falling down_

_You fall to your knees_   
_You beg, you plead_   
_Can I be somebody else_   
_For all the times I hate myself?_   
_Your failures devour your heart_   
_In every hour, you're drowning_   
_In your imperfection_   
**Skillet, “Imperfection”**

She wasn’t sure if he was at the hospital when she made her decision to ask him on the date, but a quick text had let her know he was in his lab upstairs. She just had to buck up the courage to get from the basement to a few floors up, get through the invitation in a firm, clear voice and get her meaning across, and hope for the best. If it wasn’t what she wanted, she needed to hold herself together at least till she got to the lift. Then she could let it all out, whatever feelings she felt. At this point, she wasn’t sure what they would be, to be honest. She wasn’t sure if there would be tears and sadness, or a sense of relief, or something altogether. It had been a long time for her to bring herself to this moment, and the aftermath would be something new altogether.

She couldn’t use the service lift to get all the way to Sherlock’s lab; she’d have to go to the ground floor and then get into a different elevator. The extra steps would give away her destination, she was sure, but she’d hold herself together. She gave herself one more glance in the mirror, debating another time to whether she needed the lipstick. She remembered his remark of her lips being small without it and ended up applying a light coat, not nearly as dark as before, to plump them up a little. With that, she made her way to the lift.

Her mind ran through a million and one scenarios of what could happen when she entered his labs as the service lift made it’s way upstairs and opened onto the ground floor, as she wound her way out to the main part of the hospital and the regular lifts. She nodded and smiled at those who greeted her, her heart lifting when someone complimented her hair or outfit, the added bit of confidence granting her strength with each step, each kind word firming up her smile just a bit more. By the time she pressed the up button at the lifts, she felt she could handle anything, even disappointment.

At least, until the lift door opened.

She was surprised to see Sherlock there, leaning in intently towards the woman who was the maid of honour at John and Mary’s wedding. Janine, that was her name, wasn’t it? They’d seemed a little bit cozy at the reception but she hadn’t thought much of it; Janine had stayed at the party while Sherlock had walked away, sad and alone. She had almost gone after him that evening. She _should_ have gone after him, but stabbing Tom in the hand with the fork she hadn’t realized she still had in the purse to get him to behave had meant she needed to be on her best behaviour, give her then-fiancee all her attention. Running after Sherlock would have been a gaffe of epic proportions. But she hadn’t seen Janine go after him or show any particular interest in him.

Maybe she’d been as blind to other women's interest in Sherlock as she’d been to the faults in the men she’d chosen for herself, much to her folly.

They were in their own private world, not even noticing the lift door had opened, and Janine was pulling him closer and that was all she needed to see. She choked on a sob to keep it down, not wanting them to see her, not wanting her presence to be acknowledged at all because this was not remotely one of the million and one scenarios she had imagined. She made her way blindly towards the canteen, not wanting to cry and trying everything she could to keep the tears from falling. Oh, how could she have been so stupid? Of course he would fall for someone as pretty and vivacious as Janine. It was like Tom all over again; when presented with the choice between her or a prettier, better choice, there was no contest. She was the runner-up, the one not chosen.

But she hadn’t wanted to see the results so blatantly played out in front of her.

When she got to the canteen she went to make herself a cuppa and despite her efforts, the tears started to fall. Oh, she was so foolish. She had thought one thing when it was quite obviously all in her head. Sherlock didn’t fancy her, and all the things that made her think maybe he had were simply overtures of friendship. She was a friend, simply that, nothing more, and she was an utter fool for having thought there was more to it than that. She should have realized by him slipping back to his old self these last few weeks.

“It’s a shame to see such a lovely lass crying.”

Molly sniffed and looked up at the unexpected voice to her side. There was an old man next to her, with wispy white hair on his head and a neatly trimmed beard that was on the longish side. He was nearly doubled over, leaning on an ornately carved cane so that he was shorter than her. “I’m not lovely,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m rather plain, to be honest.”

“Oh, no, dear,” he said. “Your eyes are a lovely warm brown and your hair shines beautifully in the light. It looks silky and soft. And I bet if you smiled, your face would light up.” The compliments managed to get a small smile on her face, and the man gave her a grin. “It’s a start, lass. It’s a start.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t have much to smile over today,” she said, her smile fading slightly. “I just had my heart...not broken, but I suppose all my fears were proved right. I’m not enough.”

“What do you mean ‘not enough,’ dear?” he asked.

“I’m not pretty enough, vivacious enough, interesting enough,” Molly said. “The man I was supposed to marry, a man I thought I loved, he left me for someone flashier and said the reason was because I loved someone else, so he’d find someone better, and then maybe there was a little truth to it, and when I finally decided to tell the man my fiancee thought I loved, the man I did, he...he had someone better. A woman who is just prettier and more interesting and all the things I’m not.” She started to absently stir her tea. “I just wish I was perfect. I was beautiful and was what everyone wanted.”

“Are you sure that’s what you want, lass?” he asked. “You should be careful what you wish for.”

“Why wouldn’t I want that?” she asked. “Why wouldn’t I want an easy life, where people fawn over me and shower me with compliments and bend over backward to do things to make me happy?” Molly sighed. “If I was pretty, that would be perfect.”

A few seconds later she felt a tap on her arm and she looked over and saw the man had tapped her with a wand of some sort. She gave him a curious look and he nodded. “There. Your wish is granted.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, furrowing her brow more.

“On the morrow, the perfect life will be yours,” he said, pocketing the wand. “Just remember, lass, that perfection is not all it seems.” With that, he turned away, hobbling off towards the doors to the canteen. Her eyes followed him, wondering exactly what he had meant. Surely he hadn’t _really_ granted her wish? There wasn’t an A  & E here at Barts and no psychiatric evaluation center, so he wasn’t an escaped mental patient, but maybe he was someone’s eccentric old grandfather who’d come to visit and just...wandered off. That could be a reasonable explanation.

She shook her head and then turned back to her tea. She wouldn’t let it concern her for now. Right now she’d have her tea, regain her composure, figure out some way to avoid Sherlock for the rest of the day and then figure out what comfort foods were best to pick up from the market on the way home before she had a night of crap telly and crap food. It seemed like tonight would be much like every night, unfortunately.

What a shame.


	3. Chapter 3

_How special you are_   
_Revel in your day_   
_You're fearfully and wonderfully made_   
_You're wonderfully made_   
**Skillet, “Imperfection”**

She felt...odd, waking up the next morning. Not the odd she should have felt, eating a pint of ice cream and more of her favourite take-away than normal and have a bottle of a very delicious and rather expensive red by her standards to wash it down. Oh, the headache was there, and so was the dry mouth, but there was more to it than that. She felt...different. The shape of her, first off. The length of her. She felt _taller_. _Thinner._ Felt like she wasn’t stout and somewhat lumpy but…

She got out of bed and stumbled a bit. Not the drunken sort of stumble one might expect but the “I’m not used to this body” kind of movements you would see babies take when they first started to walk. She toppled over onto her bed, clutching at the quilt, and then she noticed her nails. A deep, dark red polish was on them, and they were long, which was utterly impractical for her post. But they were beautiful, just like the nails she often considered getting just for a moment before reality set in and she got her rounded square tipped nails on the short side with the pale pink polish so she could look professional. Whatever had happened yesterday had been…

_The old man, tapping her with the stick. “There. Your wish has been granted._

She had the perfect life.

She stumbled a bit as she made her way to her loo, rather eager to turn on the mirror and take a look at what the perfect her would look like. It took a moment to fumble for the light switch; her mind was still used to short little Molly that this tall body with the graceful hands wasn’t used to what it was doing. But finally the lights came on and she blinked against the brightness for a moment before she focused and stared in wonder.

Her hair was long and sleek and straight, nearly a jet black, and so beautiful. She had blue eyes, like the color of a sapphire held up to the light, even more beautiful than Sherlock’s eyes, she’d reckon. Her lips were plump but not too big, and when she pursed them together in a pout she looked so sexy. 

Sexy. For the first time in her life she felt _sexy_ beyond belief, the absolute epitome of perfection that it seemed the men she had loved had wanted. Well, Tom had chosen a blonde but this...this was closer to what Janine was. Maybe not as curvy, but still as darkly mysterious and sensual. This could be the beginning of some wonderful times.

“Oh, this--” She stopped as her eyes widened and she clamped a hand over her mouth. Even her voice sounded different! It was rich and smooth and sultry, rather like the women in those crime noir movies who were the femme fatales. Maybe that was what she had been modeled after? Not that she had ever wanted to be a woman who would chew men up and spit them out, but to look like them, to sound like them...oh, it was such a lovely daydream.

A daydream that was now a reality.

The only thing that bothered her was that her face was already made up, and it felt rather heavy to her, as though the make-up was caked on with a trowel of some sort. But it looked expertly done, far better than she knew she could do. And it deserved to be seen by the world. She had some money to spend, and a body like this deserved some new clothing, especially as most of hers was no longer going to fit. Oh, she was sure she could scrounge up a few pieces that would fit her new shape, at least until she could buy all sorts of pretty things that fit better. But soon she’d have a new wardrobe, a better wardrobe, one that might get her more attention. If not from a certain consulting detective than...well, there were plenty of fish in the sea. He had made his choice, it wasn’t her, and she should move on.

And in this body, she could move and shake with the best of them.

Perfection was a lovely thing.


	4. Chapter 4

_So easily crushed_   
_Wanna be like everyone else_   
_No one escapes_   
_Every breath we take_   
_Dealing with our own skeletons, skeletons _  
 **Skillet, “Imperfection”**__

____

__It only took one day to realize perfection wasn’t all it seemed. Not even one full day, to be precise; simply that very afternoon._ _

__It had been lovely to go out and walk around at first, but then she noticed how much more catcalling there was towards her, especially after her first purchase of something that fit better. It wasn’t even something very sexy, just a maxi dress that stretched to her ankles but left her shoulders bare and clung to her more shapely breasts and hips. The things she heard were vulgar and insulting and she was appalled by them. One man even tried to grab her arse and pull her against him but when she went to push him away, all the upper body strength she’d developed from hauling bodies and taking self-defense classes because she associated with Sherlock was gone, and all she got was a half-hearted shove. The man almost got a kiss but his mates called him away._ _

__She went home after that, shaken and not caring about the pretty clothes she’d bought, just wanting to hide out in her flat. She didn’t even bother with a cuppa, heading straight to her bedroom and looking for something comforting to wear, something old her had that would fit this damned new body. She couldn’t find anything so she took her favourite cherry print cardigan and curled up on her bed and cried herself to sleep._ _

__When she woke up it was nighttime, and the moonlight was pouring in through the window she hadn’t bothered to pull the curtains closed, shining full on her. That was when she saw the extent of just how imperfect perfection was. In the moonlight, she could see blue veins in the skin on her arm, and if wrinkled and sagged. There were age spots all over. She could feel her eyes get bigger as she took in the extent of it and then went to her loo to see if it was the same all over._ _

__The image in the mirror frightened her so badly she nearly screamed._ _

__She could see then that the perfect, smooth, silky black hair was chemically treated, as grey was edging at the temples and it was frizzy and rough, as though it was overly processed. Her nail polish, perfect this morning, was now chipped in places, Her skin was sagging in all the wrong places and her breasts, which had been pert just hours before, sagged without the support of a brassiere._ _

__But the worst was her face._ _

__The make-up was still expertly done. No eyeshadow was smudged or mascara streaked down her face from her sobbing. But she could see now how thickly it was layered on, ow there was so much foundation used, and setting spray, and her lashes were thick with lengthening mascara and all of the things used to make a woman’s face beautiful were piled up on her face. The rest of her looked like she’d aged forty years in the span of hours but her face...her face still looked like a beautiful woman in her early thirties, younger than she actually was, all due to this... _gunk _.___ _

____It had to come off._ _ _ _

____She reached for her makeup remover and the circular sponges she used to remove her makeup and went to work. Her bottle of remover was nearly full when she started; by the time it was empty she wasn’t done yet. And oh, she wanted to cry. If this was a lesson she had to learn she was sure she had learned it. The old man had even told her, be careful what you wished for. She regretted her wish now._ _ _ _

____But it seemed her wish had more for her to learn._ _ _ _

____She switched to simple soap and water and a washcloth. She went with one that wasn’t soft, just a little rougher than normal, and began to scrub. She was almost worried she would get soap in her eye or her mouth but honestly, she reckoned that would be some small sacrifice for getting out of this hell, some small penance to pay. She didn’t dare look in the mirror for some time, hoping and praying that with enough scrubbing she would find her old face and her old body had returned._ _ _ _

____When she finally looked up, to her absolute horror, she found her hopes and prayers had not been answered._ _ _ _

____The make-up was finally off, yes, but there was an ugly red scar that ran horizontally across her right cheek, almost across the bridge of her nose, and her skin was pockmarked and red with blemishes. She had a horrible case of acne and it was oily, far more oily than her own skin was. On top of that, the psoriasis she usually kept well under control was so wildly out of control she had to bite her knuckles to keep from sobbing._ _ _ _

____This was her worst nightmare, this wish was, and she sank to the floor in front of her sink, bringing her knees to her chest and vowing never to leave her home again, never. Molly Hooper was no more._ _ _ _

____And this person she had become?_ _ _ _

____A life in the shadows for her._ _ _ _


	5. Chapter 5

_You mean so much_   
_That heaven would touch_   
_The face of humankind for you_   
**Skillet, “Imperfection”**

She left her home as soon as she got herself together and went to a dingy part of London and got herself a hotel room. If she wanted to disappear, she could do so well enough here. She wasn’t as good as Sherlock to disappear and have the world think she was dead, but she could lay low. She had had lessons from Mycroft on how to disappear temporarily should her involvement with Sherlock’s faked death come to light and he or his subordinates couldn’t get to her in time; now she put those lessons to good use. But they would only last so long. Eventually, she would need to leave London behind her and start her life somewhere else as someone else.

As she was in hiding and feeling miserable, it took her time to have the slightest inclination to want to know what was going on with the outside world, so it was nearly a week later when she turned on the telly and saw her face on the screen. Not the hideous face she saw in the mirror in the loo, but _her_. She only half paid attention to what the newscaster was saying as she stared at her old face, at her pretty smile, and her warm brown eyes.

“...efforts are being directed by Detective Inspector Gregory Lestrade of Scotland Yard. Anyone with information that leads to the whereabouts of Dr. Hooper should know there is a one million pound reward being offered by an anonymous source, with instructions for credible tips to be routed through John Watson’s blog.”

She pulled her attention away from the photograph on the telly and looked at the newscaster in shock. Greg was spearheading the hunt for _her_? A one million pound reward? John was involved? And if John was involved…

 _Sherlock_.

She looked at the clothing she had, the low-end stuff she’d bought to cover herself and all, and decided it was time to go hit some stores and buy the things to make her look beautiful again. No one would talk to an ugly hag, she thought, calling herself the worst thing she could think of as she had this entire week, but a pretty woman, they would listen to her.

****

\---

It was an arduous process to apply the tonnes of makeup needed to make her face appear blemish free. There was nothing she could do for the rest of her body, so she dressed in camouflage style of a sort: tight pants that tucked in all the right places, a push-up brassiere that made her sagging breasts perky again, and a boat neck shirt so she only had to apply the minimal amount of make-up to her neck. One box of jet black hair dye and a few hours later, she looked close enough to perfection, though she knew she wasn’t perfect and never wanted to _be_ perfect ever again.

She made her way to Scotland Yard and was surprised to see it looked different. Greg was using what pull her had to make her disappearance into a top priority case, and it appeared much of Scotland Yard was helping however they could. She could see the areas normally used for meetings were filled with people trying to figure out her whereabouts. She recognized so many people: Sally, Dimmock...even Anderson seemed to be back there, which was surprising. Mary was there, and John was tied to his laptop, occasionally lifting his head up to offer up a tip he received via his blog.

She wasn’t paying enough attention though and ran smack into Greg. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“It’s alright,” he said. He looked like he’d aged ten years in a week, and she felt horrid. She had done this to him, to them. She and her selfish wish. “Are you here with information about Mo-- Doctor Hooper?” Oh, he sounded so hopeful. She felt even worse now.

“I wanted to see if I could help,” she said.

“Well, we have a volunteer sign-up area over there,” he said gesturing to the left of them. “Mostly manning the phone line we set up, canvassing parts of London. Not much to do because every person in Scotland Yard is helping out between cases, and Sherlock Holmes has made this his top priority.”

“He has?” she asked.

Greg nodded. “Yeah. Never seen him so torn up before.” He shook his head. “Anyway, glad you’re here to help. Never hurts to have more help.” He gave her a tired smile then went into the room to go talk to the others. Sally said something to him and he planted his hands on the table and hung his head. No news, probably. She had done too good a job disappearing.

But Sherlock was looking for her. And if he wasn’t actively out looking, perhaps she could find him at Baker Street...


	6. Chapter 6

_Won't you believe, yeah_   
_Won't you believe, yeah_   
_All the things I see in you_   
**Skillet, “Imperfection”**

She went up to the familiar blue door with trepidation, not knowing what sight she’d see. “Torn up,” Greg had said. But Sherlock wasn’t one to show emotion. Not in all the time she’d known him, really. Not even when Irene Adler was supposedly on her metal table, and she had the feeling there had been something between them. So torn up over her...that could mean anything.

She tested the door to see if it was unlocked, as it usually was when Sherlock was open for clients, but it was locked. So she knocked and waited. And waited a bit more. Perhaps he wasn’t home. She knocked again, just to see, and then the door swung open and he stood there, looking quite awful. Haggard, as though he hadn’t slept in days. At least three days growth of beard on his face, dark circles under his eyes, a stern and rather angry look on his face. “What do you want?” he asked.

“I...wanted to talk about Molly,” Molly said.

For a moment there was a flicker of hope on his face, just a moment, but then it was gone and there was a sneer replacing it. “If you’re one of those damned tabloid journalists you can bugger off,” he said.

“No!” she replied, reaching for the one thing she’d taken from her flat when she’d bolted to bring her comfort, her cherry cardigan. Sherlock’s eyes went wide and he grabbed her arm, forcefully but not too hard, and pulled her inside.

“Where did you get this?” he asked, taking the cardigan from her hands. He seemed almost frantic to get an answer, as though his whole world depended on it.

“She gave it to me,” Molly said, thinking up an answer quickly. “She needed time away. Space. Things went lopsided and she needed to...go. She’ll come back, or she’ll try to. She’ll try very very hard.”

“Is she in danger?” he asked, his voice now on the edge of panic.

“Not that I know of,” she said. “Just...it’s all...different.”

Sherlock sank against the back of the door, clutching the cardigan in his hands and pressing his nose into it, inhaling the scent and then shutting his eyes. “I’ve been on a case. Two-fold. I was employed by a member of the government to investigate a man, to end his hold over her. In the course of my investigation, I discovered his PA had a rather famous, or infamous, boyfriend at one point. There were whispers she murdered him. Tired of his abuse. I thought that might be the hold her boss had over her to keep her in his employ. Two bad people taken out in one fell swoop. But I was wrong.” He barked out a humorless laugh. “Turns out it’s my best mate’s wife who dispatched the bastard to the next life. More to Mary than even I knew. And I decided the man had to go. His hold over Janine, over Mary...it had to end. But then Molly disappeared and I decided it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered, really, except finding her.”

As shocking as it was to hear about Mary murdering someone, or Janine being a victim of abuse, or the fact her boss was an evil man of some sort, she was even more shocked that none of that mattered a whit to Sherlock once she was gone. None of it. And he was spilling it all to someone that, for all he knew, could bloody well have killed the woman he cared for so much. He hadn’t asked one word about how she’d met Molly, how she’d gotten the cardigan, not at all. He had simply taken it and just...started babbling.

Oh, he did love her. If it wasn’t clear before, it was clear as crystal now.

She moved and squatted down in front of him, taking a hand of his in hers. “She knows, you know. Or well, she’s thought. But I’m sure she knows that you care.”

“It’s more than caring,” he said, opening his eyes. They looked sad and haunted, as though they mirrored all the regrets he felt, all the things he'd held inside and never said. “I love her, and she didn’t know _that_.” He wrenched his hand out of hers and stood up, leaving her facing the door. “Thank you, for this. See yourself out.” And with that, he made his way up the stairs towards the sitting room.

She was speechless at the abrupt dismissal and she felt such an awful pain in her heart. Oh, the pain she was causing Sherlock was so much worse than the pain she was causing the rest of her friends. She began to cry, cursing the tears that ran down her face. She covered her face in her hands, not caring she was smudging the make-up to cover her flaws. It didn’t matter. Perfection had cost her everything. It had cost her her friends, it had cost her love and it had hurt so many people. Perfection wasn’t perfection, and she would gladly and willingly take her old imperfections over this hell any day.

“Learned your lesson, did you, lass?”

She snapped her head up, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand and ignoring the mascara smudge dashed on it. There was the little man, standing across from her and leaning his shoulder against the door. She had never been so glad to see anyone in her life as she was to see him, and she began nodding emphatically. “Yes,” she said.

He looked up the stairs to the doorway. “Perfect did not get you the love you were meant to have. It would have cost you everything.”

“I know,” she said. “I love him. I don’t want to cause him, or anyone else, the pain I caused them. It doesn’t matter how I look. They all love me exactly as I am. And I should love myself that way too.”

The little man nodded. “Always room for a little change here and there, but don’t be wishing for what you think other people want. You’ll always find out it’s never what it’s cracked up to be. Everyone has a past, everyone's had troubles and hard times, and everyone has flaws, just like you. Even the ones that appear perfect and problem-free. Never think they don't just because they're in the business of making sure you don't see them.” He pulled his wand out and then tapped the top of her head with it, giving her a fond smile. “I think your young man would like a word with you now.”

She nodded, seeing the mascara smudge on the back of her hand was gone. Her face felt lighter than it had in hours, and her skin looked as smooth and pale as it had before. The clothes were the same but now the fit a smaller her, and she saw the familiar elastic band she wore on her wrist there again. She pulled her hair into her view and felt the soft, silky strands for a moment before seeing they were brown again, and then she felt a lightness in her heart she hadn’t felt all week.

Without caring whether her body and mind would be alright with her going back to her shorter, stockier self, she dashed up the stairs, stumbling like a drunken fool, and finally crashed down on the floor of the sitting room, jerking Sherlock out of her thoughts in his chair, the cherry cardigan on his lap. His eyes flew open and it seemed to take a long moment for him to process the sight in front of him. “Molly?” he finally asked.

She nodded. “I’m back, Sherlock,” she said, thankful her voice had returned to normal. And that was all she could get out because he was out of the chair in a flash, collapsing on the floor next to her, gathering her up in his arms and holding her tightly and then they were kissing, and she was so utterly thankful to be there in that moment as herself that she didn’t think about the questions she knew he would have, she simply kissed him back, knowing that while perfection was overrated, there were still _some_ things that were absolutely perfect, and this moment was one of them.


End file.
